US: Bera creates history, wins Congressional elections

Washington: Ami Bera on Thursday won the Congressional election from California, creating history by becoming only the third Indian American ever to have been elected for the US House of Representatives. While the counting of votes is still going on, local daily Sacramento Bee said that Bera has defeated incumbent Republican Dan Lungren for the election to California's Seventh Congressional District held on November 6.

The Sacramento County Registrar of Voters announced on Thursday that Bera increased his lead against Lungren in the race and is now ahead by 2.2 per cent and leads by 5,696 votes. Bera's lead has widened with each new count. On November 6, Bera had a lead of just 184 votes, thus necessitating the counting of provisional and absentee ballots. His lead grew to 3,800 votes on Tuesday.

While the counting of votes is still going on, a local daily said that Bera has defeated Dan Lungren for the election to California's Seventh Congressional District.

"Today's update shows that we've processed another 38,510 ballots since Tuesday's update. This leaves an estimated 7,782 vbm and of course the 31,000 provisional ballots left to process," the County Registrar said. Next update is scheduled for Monday. "It's increasingly clear that the voters of Sacramento County want new leadership that puts the people first. Our lead continues to widen and we are confident that this election will be resolved in our favour," said Bera in a statement.

He is currently in Washington for an orientation course for new lawmakers, which incidentally is being led by Lungren. Bera would be only the third Indian American to have ever been elected to the House of Representatives after Dalip Singh Saund in the 1950s, and Bobby Jindal in 2005 and 2008, who is now the Governor of Louisiana.

Besides, Bera five other Indian Americans were in the race for a seat in the House of Representatives. All of them lost. They were Ricky Gill and Jack Uppal from California, Syed Taj from Michigan, Manan Trivedi from Pennsylvania and Upendra Chivukula from New Jersey. Except for Gill who represents the Republican Party, the other five candidates were from the Democratic Party.